Dec. 29: Letters to the Editor

But can they fix the roads?

Del Mar’s newly elected city council wasted no time in passing a resolution “affirming the city’s commitment to addressing climate change, and its unwillingness to participate in the registration of Muslims or the rounding up of undocumented immigrants(Del Mar Times, Dec. 22, 2016).” A recent survey of Del Mar’s residents showed that road maintenance was considered the number one issue by respondents. As I look at the streets in front of my house, I see a pothole which is expanding with each new rain. I see a small pond which forms after every rain, which routinely gets addressed by the city by the placing of a “Flooded” sign and a few sand bags.

Lawrence Summers, former Treasury Secretary and President of Harvard, wrote in May 2016 a short piece titled “Why Americans don’t trust government.” He bemoans the fact that the Anderson Bridge in Boston, built in 1912 in 11 months, is taking more than five years to repair, the costs running up and the traffic delays causing wasted hours in people’s lives. Summers realizes “faith in government’s ability to do big things depends on its success in executing on routine responsibilities.”

So while the Del Mar City Council takes on the lofty goals of climate change and immigration policy, who is going to fix our roads?